Day of a Stranger
Robert A. Heinlein wrote a science fiction novel, Stranger In a Strange Land, and Thomas Merton wrote an autobiographical essay, Day of a Stranger... the first about a human raised among Martians and returning to Earth, and the second about someone perhaps even stranger: a monk. a hermit, living in the woods of Kentucky... But for many of us -- while we might not have been raised among Martians and we are probably not hermits in the Kentucky hills -- we are still living our days as "strangers" in an oftentimes very strange land...
To be a "stranger" is to identify as an "outsider", as one who "does not belong" -- or perhaps as one who belongs elsewhere or when... In a society riven by division, to live in recognition of a Divine Unity is to be very, very different... In a society still defined by idiotic ideas of "manliness", how strange it is to revel in the Divine Feminine... In a society that cherishes "tradition", how absurd it is to consciously commit to truly ancient traditions: and to feel the throbbing pulse of life in every particle of one's being and to know the holiness of "Only One" in work, in prayer, in play, in sexing, in conversation, and in every other great human endeavor...
How strange it is this furor over the use of public restrooms and yet hear the manic silence in the face of teen suicides or starving children or devastating pollution or the extermination of entire living species or... or... How strange to hear Christians talk of walls as foreign policy, drones as peacekeeping, or limitless profit and expansion of privilege as evidence of "God's will and blessing"... The tender "little brown speck" that is otherwise known as "God", Allah, Buddha, Krishna, Yeshua, or Divine Mother is the Real "stranger in a strange land"...
There is Only One blessed competition and that is the "competition" of an activated compassion. In other words, "Today, I will strive to love more than Love Itself!" In still other words, the pursuit and practice of justice is the proof of the pudding of our faith. Nonviolence is the way of manliness: not profit, not power, not privilege, not anti-feminism, not a rape culture, not arrogance, not bullshitting and all the other cultural "shitting" done by men who don't want to be "strangers in a strange land" but who want to possess and to dominate... To live as a "stranger" is to live aware of how precious life is and of how quickly time flies: to live as a "stranger" is to "bet" on an eternity within the very small moments of every day: when we can cook with the same passion as we make love, and mop the floor with the same integrity that we want when we kneel before the Holy One, and when we finally practice the kindness of the "little brown speck" when no one is looking, then absolutely everything will change...
Robert A. Heinlein wrote a science fiction novel, Stranger In a Strange Land, and Thomas Merton wrote an autobiographical essay, Day of a Stranger... the first about a human raised among Martians and returning to Earth, and the second about someone perhaps even stranger: a monk. a hermit, living in the woods of Kentucky... But for many of us -- while we might not have been raised among Martians and we are probably not hermits in the Kentucky hills -- we are still living our days as "strangers" in an oftentimes very strange land...
To be a "stranger" is to identify as an "outsider", as one who "does not belong" -- or perhaps as one who belongs elsewhere or when... In a society riven by division, to live in recognition of a Divine Unity is to be very, very different... In a society still defined by idiotic ideas of "manliness", how strange it is to revel in the Divine Feminine... In a society that cherishes "tradition", how absurd it is to consciously commit to truly ancient traditions: and to feel the throbbing pulse of life in every particle of one's being and to know the holiness of "Only One" in work, in prayer, in play, in sexing, in conversation, and in every other great human endeavor...
How strange it is this furor over the use of public restrooms and yet hear the manic silence in the face of teen suicides or starving children or devastating pollution or the extermination of entire living species or... or... How strange to hear Christians talk of walls as foreign policy, drones as peacekeeping, or limitless profit and expansion of privilege as evidence of "God's will and blessing"... The tender "little brown speck" that is otherwise known as "God", Allah, Buddha, Krishna, Yeshua, or Divine Mother is the Real "stranger in a strange land"...
There is Only One blessed competition and that is the "competition" of an activated compassion. In other words, "Today, I will strive to love more than Love Itself!" In still other words, the pursuit and practice of justice is the proof of the pudding of our faith. Nonviolence is the way of manliness: not profit, not power, not privilege, not anti-feminism, not a rape culture, not arrogance, not bullshitting and all the other cultural "shitting" done by men who don't want to be "strangers in a strange land" but who want to possess and to dominate... To live as a "stranger" is to live aware of how precious life is and of how quickly time flies: to live as a "stranger" is to "bet" on an eternity within the very small moments of every day: when we can cook with the same passion as we make love, and mop the floor with the same integrity that we want when we kneel before the Holy One, and when we finally practice the kindness of the "little brown speck" when no one is looking, then absolutely everything will change...
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